


Fear/Love

by Omorka



Category: Real Ghostbusters
Genre: Angst, Child Abuse, Hurt/Comfort, Multi, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-21
Updated: 2009-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-04 19:49:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/33473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Omorka/pseuds/Omorka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peter and Janine search for the source of Egon's reluctance, and, to their horror, find it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fear/Love

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for "The Boogieman Cometh" and "The Bogeyman Is Back". The warnings make it sound even darker that it actually is, but it's non-trivially dark; involves past sexual trauma of a character who was a child at the time the abuse occurred (the character is an adult at the time of the story), although it's not explicit. If this is triggery for you, please don't read. Involves a little bit of hurt/comfort at the very end. Kind of angsty.

"Thank you, Janine. I had a very nice time," Egon acknowledged, tugging off his coat and hanging it carefully in the locker next to his uniform. His fingers plucked at one lapel until the coat was perfectly symmetrical before he closed the door.

"I had a great time, too. You really should write the exhibit director and let him know about the translation he missed." Janine smiled up at him with a mixture of expectation and hesitation.

Quickly glancing around to make sure Peter wasn't watching, Egon leaned forward and pecked her gently at the corner of her mouth. A faint blush rose in his cheeks. "I will. Do you want me to walk you to your car?"

"No, I'm parked right out front. I got lucky this morning." She grinned shyly. "Not unless . . . "

He looked at her warmly over his glasses. "Unless what?"

"Unless this," she whispered, putting her hands on his shoulders and reaching up on tiptoes for a proper kiss. Her lips met his, and for a moment, he leaned into her touch, his mouth just barely open. Then she moved into the kiss, pressing her body against his, and he stiffened. With a step back, he broke the contact, a tremor running through him, and she whimpered in disappointment.

Then she saw his eyes, and gasped. A minute before, they'd been dark and half-lidded, as desirous as she'd ever seen them. Now they were wide and terrified, the pupils pinpricks in a sea of icy blue.

He shoved her away, forcefully; she stumbled on her heels, her purse flying out of her hand, but caught herself before she fell backwards into Ecto. "_No!_ No, I -" Then he stopped himself, snatching his hands back. "Janine. Janine, I'm sorry, are you all right? I didn't mean - " He was shouting, his breathing ragged.

"Physically, I'm fine, you didn't hurt me. Egon, what's wrong? I didn't mean to -"

"No, Janine, you didn't - it's not you. You didn't do anything wrong! I just - I'm sorry, I have something I need to do in the lab." His face an image of total panic, he wheeled on one foot and bolted up the stairs.

She stared after him, mouth half-open, her purse forgotten at her feet. "What the hell, Egon?" she whispered up the stairs after him.

There was a swish at the firepole behind her.

She whirled around just in time to see Peter land. "You goddamned Peeping Tom, what are _you_ doing?"

Peter glanced in the direction of the stairs. "Avoiding him." Guilt flashed across his face, then vanished into something closer to sympathy. "Congratulations, Melnitz. You are now the _second_ person ever to get close enough to him to hit that wall."

"What wall? You mean the panic attack he just had?" She shook her head, hard. "I guess I was wrong. I mean, I thought I was getting green-light signals, but that was a pretty clear rejection." She sighed. "I give up. He's all yours, Dr. V."

"Nope." The emerald eyes flickered. "I got that exact same reaction thirteen years ago. Right down to the rushing off to the lab at the end."

"Wait, you actually made a move on him?" She blinked. "The way Ray tells it, and don't you dare pick on him for telling me because it's not like I could worm anything out of you two, you and Egon just danced around it for years until Columbia hired you both and you figured it would be bad business to hit on your officemate."

"In the same way that you and Egon have been dancing around it for the last six years," Peter replied. "In that you and I have been actively pursuing, and he first didn't notice, then deflected, then flirted back in a sort of embarrassed but at least accepting-being-pursued kind of way, and then, when we went for the full-body kiss, had a total freak-out."

"Well, shit." She regarded the man who signed her paychecks with a calculating eye. "Wait, how close an exact same reaction are we talking about?"

"Well, I can't say for sure, since I had my eyes closed from the start of the kiss until he shoved me so hard I fell on my ass - nice save there, by the way - but from what I saw there, if I had videotape of both events, the only difference between his reactions would be the name he used and the angle his neck was at." Peter's mouth pulled into a frown as his eyes narrowed and darted, searching a memory he'd clearly played back a thousand times.

"That's hardly normal behavior, is it?" She scowled at him, folding her arms. "I mean, this is your area of expertise, isn't it?"

"Thus my feeling guilty about the whole thing." He met her gaze directly, and her heart almost broke; the last time he'd looked so miserable, Ray had been in the hospital and Peter had blamed himself for it. "I mean, I've been spending the last five years telling myself that it's what I get for mistaking a guy for gay, or at least bi, just because he wears pink shirts and uses more hair gel than most women. But that was deeply ingrained stereotyped behavior." The team psychologist rubbed his hand through his hair. "There's some deep trauma there that we've both just bounced off of."

"Any idea what?" Janine tried to think of other people she knew who had intimacy issues, although none of them were quite that bad.

"No, and believe me, I've pumped both him and Mrs. Spengler as much as I could. I mean, he never had the greatest relationship with his father - " Peter shrugged at that; he could relate to those sorts of issues - "and his whole family is emotionally repressed, but that shouldn't cause that visceral a panic reaction to the first gestures of physical intimacy." Peter's jaw shifted. "And he doesn't react like that to just being hugged."

This must be bad; Peter didn't usually use academic language unless he was deep in his own specialty. "He didn't have a, um, a bad sexual experience before you, did he?" Janine was guessing at this point.

Peter shook his head. "If he did, he's never told you, me, Ray, or his mother about it. And that's not like Egon; he can be tight-lipped, sure, but if something affects one of us - me and Ray especially - he usually comes around eventually."

"That's not always true," she countered. "I mean, you and Ray had been working with him in paranormal studies for years, and busting ghosts with him for almost a full year, before the Carter kids showed up and you found out he was into this stuff because of the Bogeyman."

"I think he would have been interested in the paranormal anyway. He's got some stories from before -" Peter stopped short. His eyes grew wide, and he pressed a fist to his mouth.

"That look in his eyes," murmured Janine. "I knew I'd seen it before."

"And I knew _then_ that _I'd_ seen it before; I just didn't remember _when_."

Janine pulled off her coat, tossing it on her desk, and rolled up her sleeves. "You coming downstairs with me or what, Dr. V?"

"Lead the way, Melnitz." Peter followed her as her heels clicked determinedly down the concrete stairs to the basement door, and then clinked across the metal walkway down and around to the containment unit.

"Yo. Short, squat, and ugly." Peter tapped on the viewing window; the Class Five that had been peering dismally out of it turned towards him. "Go fetch the Bogeyman. Tell him front and center, Dr. Venkman wants to rap with him."

"And why should I?" growled the yellow thing with too many teeth.

"Because you're bored out of your ectoplasmic gourd and need something to do," replied Janine, arms folded.

It thought about that for a moment. "Fair enough," it burbled, and disappeared off into the multicolored mist that shrouded the interior of the containment field.

"Seemed easy enough," Janine shrugged at her boss. Peter gave her a wry look and turned back to the window. They waited in stony silence.

After a long, tense fifteen minutes, a familiar face loomed at the viewing window. "So, the Ghostbusters have a problem they can't solve, and they need my advice?" The Bogeyman's jutting teeth and outsized lips were curled into a hideous sneer; its grating voice, even muffled by the barrier between them, sent chills down both their spines.

"Advice isn't exactly what I'd call it," Peter allowed. "More like we need to pump you for information."

"And what's keeping me from turning around and walking away again?" The entity met Peter's eyes, challenging him.

"Nothing, except that it would be inconvenient for all of us if we had to come in after you." Peter looked bored. "Besides, I can't imagine that a big-headed oaf like you would turn down an opportunity to relive your glory days."

"Spoken like a true ex-athlete," leered the Bogeyman.

Peter blinked. "How did you know that?"

"I know exactly what you had in your closet from age four to age ten, Peter Venkman. And I could probably see it up to age fifteen or so, if I tried." The Class Seven corporeal manifestation smiled; it was horrible to watch. "You weren't quite juicy enough to form a connection I could pass through, but I watched you often enough." Its yellow eyes slid to Janine. "You too, Miss Melnitz. You even heard me breathing a few times. It's too bad your bravery overwhelmed your sensitivity." It licked its lips. "You would have been . . . delicious."

Janine lifted her chin. "Prove it."

The entity leaned into the window. "A bubble-gum-pink fairy dress, complete with wings, that never matched your hair. A diary printed with daisies; you lost the key between the wall and the floorboard. A valentine from Izzy Bernstein. A pair of silver ballet shoes. A skirt with . . . ."

"That's enough. I believe you." A shudder ran through Janine, even now, at the thought of those awful eyes peering through her wardrobe at her.

The Bogeyman grinned and drooled. "Even spoiled, no longer innocent, so tasty."

"That's enough, she said. We're not here to feed you." Peter stepped in front of Janine, trying not to look like he was protecting her.

"Mmm, no, but the fact that you are both doing so makes it more likely for me to stay." The overgrown hobgoblin pressed its face against the window. "So, why _are_ you here?"

Peter took a deep breath. "Your _modus operandi_ is to crawl out of a kid's closet and scare the snot out of them, and then you suck up the fear and feed on it, right?"

"That's a reasonably accurate description, from your point of view, yes." The entity nodded slowly, its ears flapping. "Why do you ask?"

"When we watched you with the Carter kids, and then again when you did it to us, you did this whole long creeping-up-slowly routine." Dr. Venkman forced his voice to be clinical. "Is that how you normally work?"

"Yes." The Bogeyman smiled broadly. "The longer I take to reach them, the more frightened they are when I get there."

"Then what do you do?" Peter tried to make the question flat. He wasn't sure he succeeded.

The Bogeyman drew back slightly. "I scare them, of course." The lids on its enormous yellow eyes drooped slightly, warily. "Are you asking me this because you feel some professional obligation to help them through the trauma of me? Oh, how very kind of you. How much are you charging for the service?"

"You scare them by doing what?" Peter's eyes narrowed against his will.

The entity shifted slightly, then chuckled, building into a ragged laugh. "The usual things one would do to scare a child, of course." It pressed its long blue nose against the window, one hand next to it.

"Which would be . . . ?" Peter gestured in a circle with one hand and shrugged with the other.

"I do believe you're accusing me of something," the ogre mused, "but I can't imagine what." The amusement in its eyes betrayed the lie in its voice.

"Tell me what you did," snarled Peter, his clinical facade dropping away. He pressed both hands against the window, only the field and the transparent crystal separating him from the Class Seven.

"To the Carter children?" The Bogeyman's teeth were on full display as it spoke. "Nothing but loom over them, cackling and threatening. I did them no harm." It looked upwards, then back at Peter. "I don't hurt them, Dr. Venkman. That would be foolish, to damage what I feed on. If I left . . . marks . . . then their parents would believe them, and then I might have to deal with the inconvenience of feeding elsewhere."

"No marks," Peter repeated, his voice thick with disgust. The entity nodded. Peter met its eyes again. "So you _touch_ them."

"I did not say that," smiled the monster, examining its talons.

"_Do_ you touch them, then?" The words came from Janine this time, at Peter's elbow.

The Bogeyman gazed impassively through the window, first at her, then at Peter. "You're not asking about the Carter children, are you."

"Answer her question," growled Peter, his emerald eyes flashing.

"So sweet. So pure. He hadn't dared to let himself truly feel anything for almost a year, when his terror at what he was broke through to me. He _called_ me, Dr. Venkman." One awful yellow eye took up almost half the window. "He _drew_ me in, with his nightmares and his yearnings. Shall I call the Sandman over, to tell you what was already in him, in his dreams, even then? Oh, he blames _me_ for his interest in the supernatural; I heard him. But he lies, Peter."

The pointed tongue slid over bulging red lips. "You know of his ancestry now, as you didn't when we first met. You two have simple gifts, blessed with empathy and just enough precognition to scare yourselves." A thread of saliva rolled down its cleft jaw. "The round one, the one who wasn't frightened, has stranger ones. But _his_ are more complex still." One talon tapped the crystal. "Remember, Peter, when you were facing the Destructor? Remember how he suddenly _understood_ how to close the gateway to her realm?"

Peter wasn't sure where this was going, or even how the Bogeyman knew anything about Gozer. "Yeah. So?"

"Did you ever ask Dr. Stantz to explain that to you?"

Peter looked at Janine, puzzled. She shrugged. "No, why?"

"Try it sometime." The Bogeyman's grin was wide and wet. "See if he can manage to get through it without telling you that you _should_ have all died."

"We knew there was a huge risk -" Peter started, but the entity interrupted him. "Not a risk, Peter. A certainty. That was when your Ray was most afraid, and I tasted it on him. There was a _chance_ crossing the streams would work, would force her back and close the rift - and an _absolute_ certainty that the process would kill you. And yet, here you are." The hobgoblin closed its mouth and crossed its arms.

"And you're saying Egon had something to do with that?" Janine sounded as confused at Peter felt.

"Look at the devices he builds, even this monstrosity. Look what happened to him when he was shunted into the spirit realm - yes, Arzun told us. The barriers between dimensions grow weak around him, and he bends them to his will, although I do not think he allows himself to understand." If the Bogeyman actually needed to breathe, the window would be fogged. "It was not merely his technology that saved you on that rooftop; it was his power, though he does not know it."

Peter put one hand to his head, bewildered. "Even if that's true, and I can't say I have any reason to believe you, what has that got to do with - "

"He _called_ me, Peter." Talons tapped the crystal from both edges. "His power reached out into my realm and opened the door; I merely came through it." The entity's voice dropped to a hiss. "He _wanted_ me there, as proof that what he dreamed was real."

"I don't believe that for a second," Peter replied, throwing his hands out as if he could push the idea away. "Maybe, if what you're saying about him and dimensional travel is true, maybe he weakened the boundary just by existing, but he didn't want _you_."

"It doesn't matter," said Janine, in a voice that could cut steel. "I've heard that language before, buster. I've even read Nabokov. It's a lie when they say it, and it's a lie when you say it. And that tells me all I need to know."

"Then tell _me_." The Bogeyman spread its hands. "Tell me what you're accusing me of."

She glared at him through slitted eyes. "You're the ugliness that lives in people's closets. You're the dark secret that a child carries into adolescence and even beyond, that keeps them from taking comfort in someone else's touch. You're the shame that keeps people wrapped in fear long after you're done scaring them."

"Such words. Such evasions." The entity drew itself up to its full height. "_Name me._"

"You're The Closet." This time it was Peter who snapped. "It doesn't matter what's in it - what you're hiding. It doesn't matter if the kid was molested, or if they're gay, or they're gifted and they know the gift isn't accepted. Hell, it might just be being _different_. You're that fear made manifest." His hands were curled into fists at his side. "Whatever the closet is that we need to come out of, you're the fear in there that will devour us if we don't. And you're self-reinforcing." His voice was tight and shaky. "Whatever it is that's in their closet, you bring out. _That's_ what you do with them, isn't it?"

The Bogeyman shrugged. "I am what you made me. Human fear is, as you say, self-reinforcing."

There was a long silence, Janine fumed, her glasses steaming; Peter forced his hands open. Finally, he spoke. "So tell me what you did to Egon."

"I gave him what he wanted, what he called me for. So sweet. So pure." The entity's eyes were nearly closed, focused in the distant past.

"Did you - force yourself on him?" Janine forced the question out between clenched teeth.

The black-taloned blue hand made what would have been a rude gesture on a human. "In case you haven't noticed, I lack the necessary . . . equipment."

"That's bullshit. That's like saying a woman can't rape someone. You've got hands and a mouth." She stepped back, pointing one long-nailed finger for emphasis.

For an instant, the Bogeyman's twisted grin flickered, and it looked wistful. Then the leer returned. "He was so beautiful. I couldn't resist him."

"You _bastard_." Peter's fists were against the crystal again.

"He was afraid of so much. Afraid of his own intellect, afraid of his emotions and how powerful they were, afraid of his nascent sexuality, afraid of the abilities he didn't understand yet. And that on top of the usual things, like heights and social situations. So innocent. So _pure_." Suddenly the entity's expression changed, from remembrance to glee. "And unlike so many of the others, he'll stay that way. His passions still frighten him, more than he'll ever be able to overcome."

"Because of you." Janine's fingernails marked red half-moons against her palms.

"He'll stay pure forever. No mortal will ever know his touch." The monster smiled at her. "What did you do about half an hour ago, by the way? That was so strong I could feel it, even in this contraption." Drool trailed from its lower lip. "So tasty. So strong. I've drunk the terror of ten thousand children and more, and I still remember his so clearly."

"How can you say you don't hurt them when you know how badly you've damaged him?" she hissed, rearing back like a snake.

"I was everything he wanted, and everything he couldn't let himself know he needed." The Bogeyman's eyes opened fully, and its ears twitched back. "Magic, raw emotion, sensuality." Its mouth fell open, panting. "Everything you two want from him and can never have is mine, mine, _mine_."

Peter jabbed a finger, shaking with rage, against the window. "I'm done with you. Go. Now."

"Oh, I think I'm enjoying this conversation." The Bogeyman leaned against the containment field. "I should have worked harder on you, Peter Venkman. Imagine how you would have felt, knowing everyone in your world had abandoned you but me." Its wild mane stood on end. "Everyone fled from you because of how terrible you were inside. You knew what people were thinking before they said it; do you know how creepy that was for them? Sometimes you dreamed things before they happened, and that scared you and them both."

Peter's eyes widened. "How do you know that?" He stumbled back a step.

The entity smiled even more broadly. "And the awful things you felt about people - wanting to see them _naked_, boys and girls both, and _touch_ them . . . " The monster's voice was low and steady. "So awful of you! You were a filthy pervert, and creepy, and you knew too much; who could ever like you?"

"No . . . " Peter was shaking, still, but the heat of his anger had drained from him, leaving him white with fear. "That's not true . . . "

"Oh, but it is," crooned the Bogeyman. "And that was why your father ran away, because you were too awful for him to face, wasn't it?" The golden eyes were alight, beaming. "There would have been no one in your world, in that moment, except you . . . and me . . . "

"You weren't even there," whimpered Peter. Janine turned to face him, instead of the ogre. His eyes were wide, emeralds in pools of marble, and his lip trembled.

"Dr. V?" she whispered. He didn't seem to hear her.

"Imagine how the world would react, knowing that one of their so-called heroes is a filthy pervert, and has been since he can remember? So insatiable, your appetites, aren't they?" The entity gestured, talons beckoning. "Wanting so much, _so much_, and not being able to tell them because they'll reject you."

"Dr. V, don't _listen_ to him," Janine hissed. "Wake up!"

"Peter, look at me. _Look_ at me." Green eyes rose to meet the yellow, unwilling but unable to resist. "I reject no one, Peter. Everything you fear in yourself is delicious to me. Feel your fear, Peter. Let it warm you. You _like_ not being in control of your emotions, don't you?"

Peter nodded despite himself. The color was starting to return to his face, despite the shivers wracking him. He took one faltering step towards the containment unit, moving like a man entranced.

Suddenly Janine was in front of him, blocking him. "Yo. Buster."

"Get out of his way, Janine Melnitz." The Bogeyman was focusing through her, still looking at Peter.

"No. You look at me, Bogey." It obligingly met her fierce stare. Her wrath flared. Good, that was exactly what she wanted. "Take a good hard look, 'cause I see what you're doing. Do you feel any fear in me right now?"

"Of cour-" It broke off, and its eyes grew wide. "No. How did you do that?"

"Anger is stronger than fear, asshole. You've hurt the man I love most in the world for longer than I've been around, almost. You think you've molded him so he can never love me back, and I believe you're wrong, but I can't prove it yet." She took a deep breath, and glanced back for a second. "And now you're trying to do the same thing for one of the three men who's tied for second. I don't know how you're feeding off of him through the grid, but you were right about the empath thing, 'cause I can feel you doing it. And it _pisses me off_."

"So you think you can shield him from me?" The ogre rubbed its hands together. "Brave, but stupid."

"If I have to, I'll just drag him away physically." She pressed her hands flat against the window, gathering her anger in her mind, molding it as if it were something physical. "But I don't think I have to. And this is payback."

"What?" asked the entity, as Janine focused her anger into the image of a flaming spear and _threw_ the javelin of rage at it, right down its throat.

For a moment, she thought it didn't work. Then the Bogeyman screamed, a horrible ululation, clawing at its mouth. The drool that had been dripping on its waistcoat suddenly gushed bright blue; it wheeled away and fled, back into the depths of the containment unit. Peter gasped behind her, abruptly released from his trance.

"What happened?" The psychologist brushed a hand over his eyes. "Crap, it got me, didn't it?"

"Sort of. I think it was trying to hypnotize you into letting it out, or something." Janine put her hands on Peter's shoulders. "Did you really feel like that?"

"Like what?" Peter's eyes were guarded, cagey.

"Like you were a pervert, and no one could love you."

"Not mincing words tonight, are we, Melnitz?" Peter flinched. "Yeah, I felt like that a lot as a teenager." His gaze dropped to his feet. "Still do, sometimes."

She shifted her weight uncomfortably. "And Egon going into panic mode when you made your move can't have helped."

He looked back, bleakly, at the one person who now knew what that rejection felt like. "No kidding."

She looked into his face for a long moment, then leaned forward. Her lips brushed his, warm and tasting of coffee. His eyes widened, but he curled one hand around the back of her neck and returned the kiss. Then their arms were tight around each other, holding on for dear life.

"I'm sorry," Peter whispered into her hair.

Janine looked up at him, her glasses smudged. "For what?"

"For being in love with the same man you are." Peter's expression shifted slightly; a hint of his usual grin quirked up the corner of his mouth. "I mean, you're actual competition."

She shook her head fiercely. "Don't say that. Competition plays into Big, Blue, and Gruesome's game plan. Fighting over someone never healed anybody of anything."

Peter's eyebrows went up. "What are you proposing we do instead?"

"Face our fears." She put her arms around his neck, one hand in his hair. "Love is real, and it's terrifying. But it's also the cure for fear, isn't it?"

"I'm not sure I'm following." He looked down, then quickly averted his eyes as they lit near her cleavage.

"Egon might put it in mathematical language, if he thought about it." Janine poked her tongue out as she tried to remember her high school algebra. "I mean, ever since I realized you wanted him, too, I've thought of you as a rival. I love Egon, you love Egon, therefore we ought to be enemies." She shook her head, her mind racing. She'd emptied herself of fear, then anger, and what was uncovered when that swamp inside was drained was astonishing even her. "But that's the fear talking, isn't it? We're afraid that he could love, at most, one of us. That either neither of us will get what we want, or that one of us will get it at the other's expense."

Peter blinked. "That _is_ the way this normally works."

"I think, after what Bogey there did to him, that Egon needs as many people as possible to love him." Janine's eyes were sparkling. "I don't think he can afford for one of us to, um, to displace the other." She licked her lips. "If what that thing was implying about Egon is true, then one person might not be enough, anyway, although I don't trust it any farther than I can throw it. And," she continued, the hand in Peter's hair caressing the back of his neck, "I don't _want_ to be your enemy. I don't want to take him away from you, and I don't think you want to take him away from me."

He nodded. His hands found her shoulders. "I don't. But how -?"

"Maybe, without the fear, it can be different." Her face was close to his; he could feel her breath as she spoke. "Maybe, when we're not all afraid of each other, love is transitive."

"I haven't taken a math course in a decade." Peter thought he understood, but he wanted to be sure. Her skin was warm and comforting under his hands, after the chill of the Bogeyman's power.

"I love Egon, you love Egon, therefore I love you." She smiled. "And the reverse, too, I hope." She shifted her shoulders, as if she were forcing herself to relax. "I think I have for a while. I mean, we've been flirting like sixth graders since we met. At the very least, I love the part of you that loves Egon, that protects him when you're out on a bust together and drags him out of the lab when he's stuck in there."

Peter smirked. "That's pretty much all of me, except for the part I use for hitting on pretty women." He eyed her appraisingly. "Which I guess I wouldn't mind using on you, too."

She leaned in. "Do you think he'll be jealous?" she asked, a flicker of worry flashing across her eyes.

"Of which one of us?" He waggled his eyebrows at her. "I don't know. But jealousy is usually just another form of fear. Fear of loss, mostly. And your proposal here doesn't involve him losing anything from either one of us."

"That's the idea, Dr. V." They kissed again, their mouths full of desperation and hope and raw _need_. As they came up for air, her aqua eyes grew serious. "So, you're the shrink. Where do we start healing a hurt like that?"

He curled an arm around her waist and started for the stairs. "First, I want to talk to Ray and find out if the Boguester was telling us the truth about Gozer's gate. Then we're going to have to tell Egon we had a chat with Big Blue, and we'll see where things go from there." Peter gave her a sidelong glance. "How are you at making hot cocoa?"

"It's not in my job description, but for you and Egon, I might make an exception," she answered. They climbed towards the lab, side by side.


End file.
